Essay by Eric Worrall
First published JoNova, NetZeroWatch; Greens are furious the wrong kind of zero carbon energy is being prioritised?
France drops renewables targets, prioritises nuclear in new energy bill
Critics are deriding as a step backward a new French energy bill that favours the further development of nuclear power and avoids setting targets for solar and wind power and other renewables.
Issued on: 09/01/2024 – 08:26
By: NEWS WIRES
…
The proposed text affirms “the sustainable choice of using nuclear energy as a competitive and carbon-free” source of electricity, and targets the construction of at least six but as many as 14 new reactors to pull off the transition to clean energy and meet climate change goals.
But the proposed text sets no such targets for building renewable capacity, in particular wind and solar, whereas previous energy laws did.
The Ministry of Energy Transition said “it is false to say that there is no renewables objective” as the government will set the targets itself later.
But that pledge does not satisfy activists and experts.
“It’s a terrible step back,” said Arnaud Gosse, a lawyer specialising in environmental law.
‘Tending’ instead of targets
“If you only quantify nuclear power, you do not know the share of non-renewable energies. As a result, nuclear gets prioritised and, depending on remaining coverage needs, non-renewables will be the subject of floating (future) decrees. It’s no longer a mix,” Gosse said
To reach its stated ambition of carbon neutrality by 2050 France will have to massively ramp up the production and share of renewables, studies have repeatedly shown.
…
Read more: https://www.france24.com/en/france/20240109-france-drops-renewables-targets-prioritises-nuclear-in-new-energy-bill
What is going through the minds of activists who object to nuclear energy? France already gets most of its electricity from nuclear reactors, it wouldn’t take much more capacity for France to get 100% of its electricity from zero carbon nuclear.
Yet greens are wailing that renewables appear to be downgraded?
Why? What is so important about renewables? Why should any green care whether the emission reductions are achieved by nuclear energy rather than renewables? Haven’t they got a planet to save?
the author asks, “What is going through the minds of activists who object to nuclear energy”? One possible answer might be found by following the money. China probably doesn’t restrict its political activism to only the US:
A climate-focused nonprofit with significant operations in Beijing has wired millions of dollars to fund climate initiatives and environmental groups in the U.S., according to tax filings first obtained by Fox News Digital.
While the Energy Foundation’s financial filings indicate that the group is technically headquartered in San Francisco, a Fox News Digital review determined that the majority of its operations are conducted in China with a staff that boasts extensive ties to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Its recently filed tax form show the group, which refers to itself as “Energy Foundation China,” contributed $3.8 million to initiatives in the U.S. like phasing out coal and electrifying the transportation sector.
What amuses me is that people think that Russia, Saudi Arabia and China only fund one side of the political spectrum.
Why would they not buy politicians in both camps?
Every other mother does.
So it doesn’t matter who you vote for, the government always gets in...
The greens are simple-minded creatures. They can visualise the wind and the sun. A nuclear reaction is far too complex for them. So it must be bad.
What is going through the minds of activists…
Think … Bug and Windshield
What’s the last thing to go through a bugs mind when it’s hit by a car windshield?
Its Rectum
Rectum? Blew the sh!tter out of them.
The sun IS a nuclear reaction…
So is every star in the sky… billions of them… nature’s way.
And coal is a solar better.
solar battery…
Is that not what they agreed to do at the last COP increase nuclear by a third
Suck it up
This is most certainly a step in the right direction, but let’s not get too excited, this is coming from the most incompetent French government since… well ever.
They lie, they fudge, they bungle, then overspend and then they back-track.
Macron has a 70% disapproval rating.
Marine le Pen is heading for the presidency. Never mind where she came from, she is one smart cookie…
don’t be stupid M-Le-pen is one great stupid dumb f-ck
You only have to watch that muppet on the TV to realise she has less than 2 brain cells between her 2 ears!
She isn’t exactly a genius but then she actually destroyed Macron in the debate for the first Macron/Le Pen second tour.
Everybody claims the opposite.
The fact checkers all agree Marine Le Pen was INEPT.
As the rest of North West Europe is relying on French Nuclear generated electricity this is probably a good thing for the French economy
Most certainly the UK – they just ramped the price by 5%.
The excuse being that the money was needed to cover the debts created by folks who couldn’t pay the previous (cheaper) price.
Errr, isn’t going to increase the number of non-payers while deepening the sh!t the existing ones are in…..
As stated, this is: Planet Stupid
i.e. Positive feedback regimes fuelled by love of money – neither of which (in isolation) ‘end well‘ and in combination can only prove fatal
A nice example of Planet Stupid is the eBay shop selling used solar panels ”powerful and fresh from the farm‘ as brightly described.
Without saying how old they are, are listing used 265Watt panels for £65ea – do we assume it’s down to 50% output – or less?
Plus, you have to collect from the ass-end of Norwich = a 150mile round trip even for me and I’m already in the middle of East Anglia. (Norfolk is ‘quite big’)
Elsewhere on eBay, a brand new 100Watt panel can be had for £75 delivered to your door. With a warranty that it will actually make that much power.
<Peta charges The Tesla and programs up the navigator for ……. anywhere – except Norwich then: floors it>
If you fancy risking Aliexpress, look what you get for just over £20….
In the middle of East Anglia as I am (quite a sunny place – expect 13% capacity factor) – that panel would make a bit over 113kWh per year
To buy that much juice from my utility would cost £34
Not today.
We have to have our own reliable, despatchable, generations.
The table highlights the nonsense of relying on wind and solar with multiple international interconnections on the premise that the wind always blows and the sun always shines somewhere. It’s bitterly cold in Europe at present and they ain’t letting the U.K. have their juices. In addition, Vlad has certainly mapped exactly where these cables run.
Sorry: generation and juice!
Are you talking ‘cool aid’?
a little off topic but can you or anyone here provide a link or name of a site that provides the exact information for a guy living in s.e.michigan? thanks.
The exact information is provided by my site which is globally accessible
https://gridwatch.org.uk
It does not have data for the USA though.
Any idea what the unreported 2.4% is?
Those numbers add up to a little less than 100% (97.6%)
‘other’ is the BM reports category, although what it actually consists of is a mot point. Also solar power is an estimate – no one actually measures it centrally.
So in a country sitting on massive piles of coal, the UK gets twice its electricity from wood from the US and I assume Canada then it gets from native coal.
Makes sense to me, and dollars to American and Canadian businesses and workers.
I will say sorry FIRST this time: LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL
UK is not a country sitting on massive piles of coal anymore. It was mostly mined out by 1970.
It is however sitting on a lot of gas.
But the greens wont let us frack it…
you crazy? mined out??
The UK has enough coal in it for the next 400 yrs at 1960s consumption rates!
“than” it gets…
When the two major bastions of freedom – the USA and the UK – get decent politicians in power we will fight back as the French are doing, but at the moment we both have liabilities at leadership level and nobody prepared to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Johnson was not the answer and only ever did half the job. Trump had them worried, so worried, and we all know what happened as a result.
There just may be some very big surprises indeed on the election front this 2024 and it may not make for pretty watching and this time it may really be “real” and not “let’s pretend”.
Perhaps we should wait for the Imperial College predictions, huh, because we could do with a good laugh.
The significant problem for the UK is The Blob.
A vary large, deeply entrenched but unspoken, mass of people working in myriad, nay countless Government offices.
Some say 10million in number but even Gov’t itself doesn’t know.
Despite all their fine words they are working selfishly and absolutely for their own personal benefit – and the benefits of working for Government are immense compared the private sector.
Climate Change is all they could have ever wished for in order to cement their positions, salaries and pensions.
What’s needed for UK (and the US) is an ‘Argentina Moment’ = cull at least 50% of the entire civil service
Thus wake the rest up and make it obvious that they do what they’re told and not what they want to do, else they’ll be next out of the door
Western politicians are simply complete amateurs at anything except getting elected, and the autocrats of the world know it.
Sadly, the judiciary have moved beyond the well tried and tested truth, whole truth and nothing but the truth. Now we have people being fined and even imprisoned for telling the truth! Those cases are increasing with the prosecution adopting the new ‘legal’ high ground of, hate crime. The facts are less important now than the emotions of the so called victim?
We have had a case in Switzerland of all places, where the defendant quoted directly from the Koran in their defence. No matter, the court ruled the quoting of what is in the book followed by so many and leading to some awful outcomes was upsetting and risked promoting a public reaction.
The defendant was found guilty of telling the truth and fined for doing so…..?
What do you think the election result in the UK is likely to be, then?
At the moment its surely looking like a popular vote which has a pretty high percentage for Reform – maybe as much as 15-20%. Who knows, its rising every week. But the result of this in the UK political system will probably be a wipeout for the Conservative Party, and a landslide for Labour, but minimal Commons presence for Reform.
There are 650 MPs in the Commons. Depending on how well Reform does, you can imagine the Conservatives falling to under 100, other parties perhaps 100, and Labour with 450 and a 250 seat majority. Could go higher, there have been projections of a Conservative rump of well under 100 MPs.
You can imagine Conservatives reduced to 50, at an extreme. Other remains at 100. Then you have 500 Labour MPs (helped by the ongoing SNP implosion) and a Labour majority of 350. Its pretty far out in probability, but its definitely possible.
Its quite likely, that in all these scenarios Reform gets at best a couple of seats because their vote is spread across the country and not focused on particular constituencies. Enough to push the Conservatives out, but not enough to win, so Labour gets in because the conservative vote is split.
The chances of any change in UK Net Zero policies as a result of the likely November election seem to be negligible. All the parties contesting, Conservative, Labour, SNP, Greens, Plaid, Liberals, all of them are committed to Net Zero.
Or do you think a sudden landslide for Tice and Farage is a serious possibility?
I think that given the choice between same old Labour, same old Tory, same old Limp Dumbs, and same old SNP Greens and Plaid Cymru, voting reform is a reasonable alternative to spoiling the ballot paper or simply not bothering to vote at all.
A lot of people agree with you. I see Reform is now up to 18% in the latest ITV poll. A movement on this scale from the Conservatives would be a very serious matter for them.
However, the question is the same: surely with the current UK system even if Reform gets over 20% of the vote it could just bring about a Labour landslide in seats.
The problem for Reform is that its vote is spread out over all constituencies, so the most likely outcome, even if they get into the high twenties, must surely be a Labour landslide. My scenario with Conservatives reduced to a rump of 50 MPs.
Thge 18% is hard to assess. It doesn’t necessarily translate into actual votes on election day, and there are still nine months to go so a lot can change. But if it carries on, and momentum builds, it is starting to be conceivable that there could be a swing comparable to that in Holland for Wilders, or comparable to the rise of the AfD in Germany. But Holland is proportional representation, so the outcome will be very different.
I still think that in this scenario a Labour majority of 200+ is the most likely outcome. I can’t really see Reform getting to enough seats to be a force in Parliament. But one interesting possibility is the effect on public feeling if they were to get (say) 30% of the vote and 5-10 seats. I don’t know how likely it is, but imagine a wild result something like this:
% vote seats
Labour 35 500 (because of split of cons vote)
Conservatives 25 50
Reform 30 10
Liberals,Ind+SNP 10 90 (because of die-hard SNP vote)
I don’t know how plausible or likely anything like this is, but if it happened surely the effects on public opinion would be extreme? I’m not sure the country would accept it. Though what they would do about it…?
Well, we shall find out in November.
Sorry, formatting screwed up. I meant:
Labour 35% vote, 500 seats
Con 25% vote, 50 seats
Reform 30% vote, 10 seats
Other 10% vote, 90 seats.
Holy Cow, things are afoot….
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-67939708
Pop over to Finland as they’ve worked the bugs out at great expense and now have a handle on it-
TVO – Olkiluoto produced last year about 31 percent of the electricity consumed in Finland
The European Pressurised water reactor designed by EDF is a dog, but as with a Porsche, tinker with it enough and it can be made to work.
[story tip]
Same thing is apparently happening in the UK
UK releases roadmap to quadruple nuclear energy capacity
That means they are projecting only 100Gwe or thereabouts total grid capacity. Its not nearly enough.
Still it is, at least, a start…
The British Government should have started building nuclear power stations forty years ago or more.
The ultimate goal for them though is still an irrational one. Nuclear is fine for base load power, but you also need coal and gas as well to be able to respond to the daily and weather-related fluctuations in demand. The fantasy still seems to be that Ruinables can replace coal and gas, and that is just dream world craziness.
Nuclear can run in fully dispatchable mode, it is merely a matter of cost.
At the moment a half used gas plant is cheaper to build and run than a half used nuke, but if gas gets more expensive…
Just because nuclear is the most profitable when used as base load, doesn’t mean it cannot load follow. It is probably technically better at that than coal.
AND any variations in output will probably shorten the life of the plant.
Surry Va. now licensed for 80 years from commissioning, and North Anna soon to be the same 80 years, both built in the 70s of the same design (Westinghouse) and NO problems of any consequence EVER.
SO don’t mess with nuclear by varying the output, unless it was specifically built for that purpose.
NuScale, probably close to bankruptcy, has a SMR design that put “safety” in the form of automatic “no power input required” shutdown systems and variable output capability to provide for unreliable output of unreliables.
Apparently the excessive safety features made it VERY expensive to build, needing massive amounts of concrete and steel for the water bath the reactor would drop into for natural cooling.
The North Anna site was originally licensed for 2 more units never built. In 2017 it received a license to build a “safer” design for a third plant. I am sure way more expensive to build that the original Westinghouse design.
Just go back the the Vepco/Westinghouse design of the 1970s and build a bunch.
NOW, both Virginia plants use open source fresh water for cooling, Surry using the James River and N. Anna using a Lake Anna built on the North Anna River to provide the cooling, so no cooling towers for added expenses.
No. Variations in power output shorten the life of the fuel rods only.
If you are interested in facts rather than hand wavey opinions, read this.
______________________________________
Because saving the planet isn’t the goal.
Nope, the ultimate goal is to launder taxpayer’s money through the green gristmill to the leftist politicians who run much of the western countries today, and the leftists NGO who help those politicians control the MSM and social media dialogue and, thus, help the selfsame politicians get elected.
“Why? What is so important about renewables?”
They worship the sun and wind- showing how it’s a religion.
I know I’ve said it’s a religion, but just maybe it’s politics.
The wheels are beginning to fall off the climate change industrial devolution bus-
Car rental firm Hertz to sell 20,000 EVs for gas-powered vehicles (msn.com)
That’ll really help with painful EV depreciation already.
Wow, look at their stock price, dropped by more than 50% from August.
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=hertz+stock+price&t=chromentp&ia=web
Did Blackrock dump their stock because they became unwoke?
Inquiring minds want to know!
I suppose you mean Hertz stock, and that Hertz became ‘unwoke’, tho’ Blackrock is implied.
Notwithstanding recent maintenance issues with about half of France’s 59 nuclear fleet, they have been supplying about 80% of demand, the balance being hydro, geothermal, natural gas (from North Africa), and 2 – 3% wind/solar and a wave machine.
The nuclear reactors have never run at full potential and maximum efficiency, because France’s grid infrastructure couldn’t carry the load. It has been much developed over the last 20 years.
That meant that much of the rural population – a large part of the French population – used wood stoves, oil, LPG for heating and wood stoves and bottled gas for cooking. Electricity was mostly for lights, TV, refrigerator and small appliances.
In 2002 when I was renovating a property in France, I was told less than 20% of homes in France had fitted kitchens with all the built-ins and appliances, few with central heating.
France has always been a net exporter of electricity, because it does not use, by some significant measure, the output possible from its nuclear fleet.
There was no rationale nor logic for France to subsidise and install wind and solar to replace its nuclear fleet – the target at the time was to replace a third of nuclear output with wind and solar – other than the nonsense that nuclear was not a ‘renewable’ (which it is, as spent fuel rods are reprocessed) and not ‘carbon neutral’.
Piped gas is confined to cities and a few large towns.
After the European idiots cut themselves off from Russian gas and panic ensued, Emperor Macronavirus saw the light, and realised France with mostly nuclear electricity was self-dependent, not at risk of geopolitical shenanigans.
I think it proves, wind & solar is just ideological posturing for people deeply ignorant, malevolent, and with no interest in the environment or Humanity, just themselves.
It is true France uses a lot of motor fuels. It is a large Country – much less urbanised compared to the UK for example – with a large scattered rural population, making reliance for most on bus services or trains impossible. Motor transportation is vital for distribution of food and goods, farming, small business and private use.
Trying to electrify the road/vehicle system, given the geography and demography, is neigh impossible on practical and cost grounds. I cannot see the France responding well to the banning of ICE vehicles or any further attempts to carbon tax motor fuels, particularly diesel on which France mostly runs.
“Trying to electrify the road/vehicle system, given the geography and demography, is neigh impossible on practical and cost grounds.”
Now look as the US, or Aus.
https://www.mylifeelsewhere.com/country-size-comparison/united-states/france
https://www.mylifeelsewhere.com/country-size-comparison/australia/france
Nice site mylifeelsewhere, for these comparisons.
Correction: piped gas was confined to cities and big towns but not any more. I can only answer directly for the southern part of Burgundy but I am assured that the areas not on the gas grid are now largely those départements where the exercise would be so costly as to make it counter-productive. Isolated farms and hamlets still rely on bottled gas as do similar dwellings in most European countries.
As for EVs, you’re right enough. There are certainly areas where they would not be a cost-effective option. At the same time France sees itself still as a largely rural country (which it is!) and every French citizen is entitled as far as possible to the same rights as every other French citizen. Which means that France will tailor its climate commitments to its own circumstances as far as that is practicable.
“neigh” impossible… are they still using horses?
as a former head of the UNIPCC stated – the real goal of the environmental movement is the destruction of capitalism
The real intent of NutZero is to collapse the Western Economies. Windmills and solar panels will never accomplish NutZero you before go financially in ruin.
Nuclear Power will allow you to get to net zero and still remain a viable society.
Sanity?
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/per-capita-electricity-fossil-nuclear-renewables?country=~FRA
63% and we will see it falling and failing in the next few years.
Seen the latest build times of european reactors? It won’t even be fast enough to keep the status quo
Burning you house down and buying an alarm system will both lower your risk of burglary. Just burn it down to be even more secure. Do you want to get robbed?
20 – 25 years ago when global warming was ramping up, I thought that the only viable solution was nuclear power. I thought climate activists would be forced to accept it.
OK it took longer than I expected but it is finally (I hope) happening.
In the last year or so I have read numerous articles about other nuclear designs such as molten salt. I have read about nuclear waste storage facilities in Finland. Maybe reality is setting in.
Without a solution to the intermittency problem, solar and wind don’t work. Batteries are a fantasy. Orders of magnitude less than required. Pump storage lacks suitable geography.
I don’t see any viable choice other than nuclear.
The nuclear industry was an early advocate of man made global warming due to CO2 to promote their product. It is finally bearing fruit for them.
DEEP OCEAN VOLCANOS CAUSE INCREASED GLOBAL WARMING BY PERIODIC EL NINOs
https://www.windtaskforce.org/profiles/blogs/natural-forces-cause-periodic-global-warming
EXCERPT
In January 2022, the Hunga Tonga volcano, located close to the Solomon Islands, exploded, resulting in massive rain and flooding in Australia, in Jan/Feb 2022
The eruption of the Hunga Tonga–Hunga Haʻapai volcano did more than just launch a destructive tsunami and shoot a plume of ash, gas and pulverized rock 55 kilometers (34 miles) into the sky.
It also injected 146 megatonnes (161 megatons) of water vapor into the stratosphere (the layer of the atmosphere above the troposphere)
Heating and Evaporating the Water: (145 million metric ton x {(22 C seawater heated to 100 C = 78 C delta T) x (4186 J/kg-C = 326508 J/kg ) + (40650 J/18 g mole x 1000 = 2258333 J/kg)} = 0.3774 exajoules
Because the eruption occurred only about 150 meter underwater, the red hot lava immediately superheated the shallow seawater above and converted it explosively into steam.
As a result, the water content of the entire atmosphere increased by 10 to 15%, meaning more rain would be distributed worldwide, over time.
This is an additional reason why there was:
1) Increased rain and flooding in Australia in Jan/Feb of 2022, and
2) Increased lower-atmosphere warming during 2023, because water vapor is a strong greenhouse gas.
This warming was added to other warming, such as due to CO2, etc.
Satellite measurements showed, in July 2023, the temperature of the lower-atmosphere increased from
0.38 C to 0.64 C above the 1991-2020 mean.
The source of such large additional warming certainly was not from human CO2, which, by itself, gradually increases lower-atmosphere temperatures, as measured in 2023.
https://www.scienceunderattack.com/blog/2023/8/21/record-heat-may-be-from-natural-sources-el-nino-and-water-vapor-from-2022-tonga-eruption-136
The last strong El Niño, increased lower-atmosphere temperatures by about 0.14 C in 2016.
For comparison, it takes a full decade for current global warming to increase temperatures by that much.
The strong El Niño of late 2023, coincided with increased lower-atmosphere temperatures of about 0.30 C, that were augmented by the after effects of the Hunga Tonga volcanic eruption in January 2022. See Images 1 and 7
Every once in a while we see a glimmer of hope when, apparently accidentally, a prominent leader chooses policy that is actually based on the universe we live in, and not on some drug induced dream of unicorn farts and pixie dust.
If France builds at least six nuclear plants there obviously is no need for any more wind or solar. It is wind and solar that send us backward not nuclear. These renewable gangsters need to take a hike.
“Haven’t they got a planet to save?”
Not really. If it was about saving the planet, there are a lot of better ways to do it. The fact that they have chosen the worst of all possible methods says a lot.
At last there is a general realisation dawning that Net Zero and several other doom-laden climate fantasy forecasts that are, in reality, utter nonsense and a HUGE waste of money – promoted of course by those who want to beggar the economies of Western Countries.. We see this fight-back in the UK (at last) with the UK government reopening some North Sea Oil reserves – so allowing us to combat the many excessive and past ill-considered so-called ‘green’ initiatives. We need scientific reality and not manipulated temperature records (as currently seen in the USA) driving our future.